The SAMO Company has officially announced the completion of the first round of funding for TheBank.vn website on January 28, with investment from CyberAgent Capital and Ncore.

Though specific details were not disclosed, with this capital Thebank.vn plans to improve the customer experience, from applications for loans, cards, and insurance to the selection of financial products that meet their current needs.

TheBank.vn also plans to become a full stack solutions provider based on technologies in bid data, eKYC, Chatbot, and credit scoring.

Mr. Nguyen Dat, General Director of SAMO, said that one must understand the nature of customers to provide effective service, so quality connections are critical. “It is very easy for us to talk about potential, but to develop an online financial services company is not simple,” he added. “We have accumulated important experience in preparing for rapid and solid growth in our customer base.”

Mr. Dzung Nguyen, Head of the Vietnam and Thailand Office of CyberAgent Capital, said that with consumer behavior being increasingly based on technology and interest in experiential consumption over recent years, the potential for financial technology (fintech) companies is enormous. “The key now is extensive investment and the right implementation,” he noted.

Established and put into operation at the end of 2014, prior to this funding TheBank.vn has been the leading financial comparison app in Vietnam with the highest traffic and largest number of partners and consultants.

The company offers a platform to compare and evaluate products such as credit cards, unsecured loans, collateralized loans, savings interest rates, and life and non-life insurance products. It connects with and advises customers and provides financial product distribution packages for banks and insurance companies using modern technology.

After only four years of operations, TheBank.vn has recorded nearly 20 million visitors, served more than 1 million customers, classified and compared1,300 financial products, and has more than 24,000 active financial experts registered on its website who are available to interact with clients.

It has also become a digital partner of nearly 30 banks and financial institutions, such as Standard Chartered, HSBC, ANZ, Shinhan Bank, VPB, EVN Finance, and TPB Finance, and large insurance companies like Prudential, Manulife, Chubblife, and Liberty.

In the face of the Industry 4.0 wave, especially in Asia - a hotspot for fintech and insurtech (insurance technology) - funding to companies like TheBank.vn demonstrates the continued development of Vietnam’s digital financial market that benefits users.

According to TheBank.vn, Vietnam’s sizeable untapped market is its most attractive feature, with 41 per cent of Vietnamese adults not yet using banking services and only 8 per cent of the population having life insurance.

In the past two or three years, a rise in the emerging middle class has been seen not only in Vietnam’s major cities but also in key provinces, which create growth momentum for the whole market.

Credit cards and consumer loans are where banks are aggressively competing for market share, while insurance holds potential for future development. The market is growing at an average annual rate of 15-20 per cent, while the life insurance market size and consumer loans are expected to increase by 40 per cent by 2020, to $14 billion.